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The Seventies, and my brush with famous artists

I am in the process of preparing to do PR for my upcoming solo show at the Bromfield Gallery in November, and have been spending way too much time this morning getting sucked into blog-reading while I am supposed to be researching writers who might be interested in my work.

While blog-surfing, I discovered a couple of must-reads: Joanne Mattera's blog is witty, literate, and super-interesting, and she features shows she has seen in New York that she likes.

I went to art school at Carnegie Mellon in the 1970s. Who knew that the girl next to me painting those big expressionist hearts was Deborah Kass, now pretty famous NY artist? You have to read this article she wrote about feminism and art in the '70s, in her article in the Brooklyn Rail. As far as I know, she is one of the very few of us who moved to NY and made a real name for herself.

In the article, she discusses the male dominated art school faculties and the whole "painting is dead" mentality of the time. But she also says that the 70s were a time when women artists were actually perceived as a on a par with their male counterparts, having lots of visibility and forging new territory.